Late Spring Rain

After what felt like 6 weekends straight of dry and wonderful weather, mother nature decided it was time to end that streak as rain crept into Western Washington Sunday afternoon. But the real jolt of moisture came in this morning as a rather strong cold front for this time of year is pushing through as I type. There have been reports of rain all across the region, as can be seen from the latest radar image from Camano Island.

What was even more remarkable about this system was just how humid it was this morning. Dew points across the region were well into the 50s, with temps not too far off (Dew point temperatures are a measure of the amount of moisture in the air). The higher the dew points, the muggier it feels but we do not get dew points very high around here due to our close proximity to the cool Pacific Ocean. Areas around the gulf coast know muggy, with dew points regularly in the 60s and 70s due to the warm and very moist Gulf of Mexico which often times can stream up into the middle parts of the country. Here is the latest surface observations from around the region, with dewpoints in blue at each station.

This can also be seen from the vertical sounding at Quillayute on the Olympic peninsula(no idea how to spell that)

with a very moist environment from the surface up to 600mb, quite impressive with the large temperatures.

The latest time series from the University of Washington shows how the temperature and dewpoint have evolved over the last 72hrs,

With a sudden jump to near saturated Sunday afternoon.

All in all, what does this mean? Well this will be a rather wet Monday but the rain doesn't stop there. Shower threat will continue Tuesday through Thursday, dwindling as the weekend approaches. For now, looks like the weekend will be dry.